You Must Listen to What I've Learned After Owning an Electric Bike! | Owning Ebikes for Adults

Hey everyone, I'm Dustin. I have nearly 20 years of experience with e-bikes and bikes, and today I'm here to tell you what I've learned after owning an e-bike. Stick around.

All right, so today I'm going to share with you what I've learned after owning an e-bike for, well now about four years. But before I do, hit the subscribe button below. Stay in touch with us here at Sixthreezero. Be the first to know about all the new content, new products, and of course giveaways we're doing here for bikes, e-bikes, and accessories. So hit subscribe. All right, so I've owned an e-bike now for about four years and I want to share with everyone what I've learned and what my experience is.

So when I set out to get an e-bike, I didn't have any use cases in mind for it. I just thought, wow, these are cool. I want to get an e-bike. So the one thing I've learned is how I use my e-bike and how I thought I'd use my e-bike are two different things. Well, I guess in some sense I didn't know how I'd use my e-bike. I thought I would just ride it around town. The reality for me though has morphed into so much more than that. So I do ride it around town, but I also use it for exercise and I think that's surprising to a lot of people. But the reality is, is having the pedal assist allows you to push your body more. It also allows you, you can ride the bike like a regular bike, and then having the assistance and the motor available allows you to go farther, and then when you need to come home you can use the motor. So it actually gives you some confidence knowing you can get back home if you so choose.

The other thing I use it for now though, is I use it to transport my kids a lot. I've hooked up a child trailer to it, I take them to school, I pick them up, and honestly, it doesn't seem like much, but that saves me about three miles a day of driving a car, which can equate to, I mean, like 1,000 or $2,000 a year honestly in gas savings just from saving those 3 miles a day. And that's just for the pickups and drop-offs for my children.

The other thing is we go to the parks, we do things like that. Me, I also can ride to the beach, which is about seven miles from my house. I really wouldn't want to do that on a regular bike. So I've just found that I can use it for so much more and the assistance gives me not only the confidence but the ability to take on hills and things like that that I wouldn't have with a regular bike. So I guess in my mind I just thought I'd ride around a little bit. I didn't think I would use it for school pickups and drop-offs. I didn't think I would go to the beach because it was seven miles away, but I've been doing all of it. So you may be surprised after you own an e-bike that you're going to use it in lots of different ways than you ever thought expected. So don't limit yourself is what I want to say, try to push yourself to use that e-bike in as many ways as possible, and honestly can become a form of transportation and save you money. And also, you can take people with you, pick up groceries, and do things like that.

All right, so in addition to that, things I now know after owning my e-bike. They're pretty simple all in all. Honestly, I thought they would be very complex or I was fearful about maintenance or things like that. Most e-bikes just come and everything's integrated. It's in a sense a bicycle that has moving parts like chains and cranks and wheels and things like that. But it's more or less just like owning a TV. Everything's nicely integrated, the motors, the batteries, things like that. So it's not that much different than owning a regular bicycle other than the fact that you have the electric pedal assist and some have throttles. It's not like you're having to deal with electronics other than charging the battery. So it's a pretty simple operation.

Now, that's another thing I knew, I learned is owning, is charging the battery does take some time. If you let the battery drain down, it's going to be about four to six hours to get a full charge on that battery. So you just need to be aware of that if you're riding it a lot, charging it at night, to be ready for the next day. So it does take some time to get that battery charged up.

The other thing I've been riding my e-bike without the electric and one thing I've kind of learned is it's not that much different than my regular bike if I ride the electric without the pedal assist. Now it's a little bit heavier, don't get me wrong. But I've been excited about the fact that I can use it as a regular bike, and ride around town if I so choose to just get more exercise by not engaging it. That's possible. I guess when I first got an e-bike, I wasn't quite sure how that all worked in terms of can you do it as a regular bike, can you not? How does the motor work? Things like that.

The other thing I've learned is there are local laws regarding e-bikes. There are a lot of places nowadays, and one of the unfortunate things is that you can't ride. So you do have to pay attention to your local city or state where you can and can't ride. Also, speed limits are something that's been popping up for bikes on different paths and different areas, things of that nature. So four years ago when I got an e-bike, there weren't as many laws in place quite honestly, but now that so many people are getting them, you have to pay attention to where you're riding, where you're going, where can you legally ride and where can you legally not ride. So just something to be very careful about.

In addition to that, going back to what I said about it being an e-bike and being fairly simpler, there hasn't been a ton of maintenance, honestly. I've had one e-bike for four years, it's still holding up. I haven't ridden it an exorbitant amount in a lot of times you may, after two years if you're riding a lot and charging that battery a lot, the battery could die and you may need to replace it. I haven't had that issue. I've just tuned up my bikes once, twice a year. In particular, the brakes. You probably want to get a brake adjustment at least once, or twice a year if you're riding a lot to make sure those brakes are properly adjusted and dialed in. As your brake pads start to wear, you need to adjust the calipers to make sure they clamp tightly on the rotors if you have disc brakes. So that is something to know that you probably want to get brake adjustments or learn how to do it yourself to adjust your brakes as you're riding.

In addition to that, one thing I've learned is I do have my original e-bike from four years ago, but now I have other e-bikes. So I've bought different e-bikes for different purposes honestly because there are lots of different e-bikes out there. So now I have an e-bike to bring my kids with me. I have an e-bike for my singular riding. I have an e-bike to go off-road with. Now it sounds a little bit excessive, but I've gotten quite obsessed with riding e-bikes and where I can take them, and not every e-bike is great for one particular thing. I do have one versatile e-bike at home, my Sixthreezero EVRYjourney. But I have other e-bikes for dirt paths like mountainous riding. I have a tricycle to go pick up groceries at the store and then I have another one where I can put my kids on the back and they sit on it.

So I guess what I was saying originally is your first e-bike may not be the e-bike you have forever or you may find a different e-bike. You may also want several e-bikes. I mean some of these new 20-inch wheel fat tire e-bikes may not be as practical for longer pavement rides. Those might be good for your shorter rides or off-road rides. So there are just so many different types of e-bikes out there. For me, it's become a little bit of an obsession and having all these different types of e-bikes. So I think as you get into it and you experience it, you'll start to see what the excitement is about and also why it is in some cases beneficial to have multiple e-bikes if you want to do all sorts of different types of riding. If you just want to round the town pavement, riding one type of e-bike may be best for you.

Other than that, after owning an e-bike, I just have to say they are hugely, hugely beneficial. I think the value even from 1,000 to 2,000, $3,000 and up, there's huge value in e-bikes. And I think the one thing is a lot of people see the price tag and they might be scared away from it. I have gotten the value back on my e-bike so many times over now by replacing my car rides with my e-bike ride, by taking my kids' places. And by the way, by just getting outside, getting my body moving, those few thousand dollars have been more than worth it. So my thought is if you at home go and buy an e-bike, you're going to find the benefits you're going to get back from owning it far outweigh any price tag you'll pay.

So that's my experience, what I've learned after owning an e-bike. If you have any other questions at all, please comment below or call us at Sixthreezero, at 310-982-2877. You can also email the team at sixthreezero.com. And also if you're looking for e-bikes, check out our website at sixthreezero.com and take our proprietary body fit quiz on our website, answer a few questions about your body and your life. And under two minutes we'll recommend the perfect e-bike for you. And we also have a 30-day test drive on your e-bike policy. If you don't love your e-bike within 30 days, send it back, no questions asked, no money out of your pocket.

And lastly, download our app and join our Facebook peddlers group before you purchase, and talk to other e-bike riders that have sixthreezeros. See how they're riding their e-bikes on the app. It's a cool place to get familiar with the different types of e-bikes we have. Then after you get an e-bike from Sixthreezero, track your rides on the app, compete on the leaderboard for giveaways of bikes, e-bikes, and accessories, and also make new friends in the peddler's group. It's tons of fun. So thanks for sticking around. And don't forget, it's your journey, your experience. Enjoy the ride.